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Black Friday
Black Friday is the seventh episode of the seventeenth season of the animated series South Park. It is the first of a three-part story, continued in "A Song of Ass and Fire". It is a parody of Game of Thrones. Prelude Realizing that winter is coming, the inhabitants of South Park prepare for the annual battle on Black Friday - the day after Thanksgiving, when the Christmas shopping season official begins. They are shocked to hear that the shopping mall is giving out an 80% discount to the first thirty people to get through the front doors. All anticipate a bloodbath in the fight to get the discount. The boys of South Park, however, see opportunity: the Christmas 2013 season will see the debut of the new, Eighth Generation video game consoles X-Box One and Playstation 4. Normally, these would be far too expensive for them to buy as soon as they come out, but with the discount, they would be able to buy them immediately. Unfortunately, they soon break into two factions, between those who want to buy X-Box Ones and those who want to buy Playstation 4's. Wizard-King Cartman (not a king of wizards, but a king who happens to also be a wizard) sets himself up as head of the X-Box One faction, while Stan champions the Playstation 4 facton (due to its superior hand-held controller). Kyle grudgingly sides with Cartman because he feels the X-Box One is technologically superior but is deeply regretful to be fighting Stan. Cartman proves adept at intrigue and forging new alliances, bringing other groups such as the Star Trek fans onto the X-Box One side. Drastically outnumbered, all seems lost for the Playstation 4 fans, but deciding to do what "Game of Thrones would do" they try to beat Cartman at his own game by forging even stronger alliances...by writing to Sony itself. The makers of Playstation 4 in Japan actually take the threat very seriously: they realize that while South Park may be one small town, if the news media gets word that Playstation 4 lost such a head-to-head competition against X-Box One, it could quickly become national news and tarnish their entire image, and possibly make them lose the entire format war. Sony therefore extends a special rebate discount for Playstation 4's in South Park, which brings some support back to Stan's side. Nonetheless, things are looking grim for the Playstation 4 fans...until a stunning betrayal. Many of the boys follow the beautiful Lady McCormick (Kenny cosplaying as Daenerys Targaryen), but Cartman takes McCromick aside to urge that "she" cannot call herself "Princess", because Cartman and Cartman alone is the head of the X-Box faction. McCormick feels robbed of "her" birthright to be a princess (much as Daenerys Targaryen was), so in an abrupt reversal, she switches sides to the Playstation 4 fans and takes many of the X-Box One supporters with her. Both sides now gear for war, training for combat against the swarming crowds of zombie-like shoppers that they will face on Black Friday. Cartman responds with similar tactics, calling in to Microsoft to inform their X-Box One department that Sony is actively promoting Playstation 4 in South Park. Their current CEO dismisses this competition as nonsense and doesn't want to be involved in petty rivalry - until Bill Gates hears of it. He returns to Microsoft and has the CEO assassinated so he can resume control. Gates them begins actively arming the X-Box One fans in South Park by giving them medieval hand weapons such as maces and swords, and even a few handguns. Princess McCormick nontheless refuses to back down, claiming she will not be denied the rulership that is hers by right. Meanwhile, Cartman sends Ser Butters to Sante Fe, New Mexico, to speak with author George R.R. Martin and ask him how Game of Thrones will end, so they can use the same strategy that the winners use against the Playstation 4 fans. Martin is surprised to see Butters, and though he does start to explain the story, the actual "end" is several books away, and Martin insists on explaining the entire story in order. The explanation soon drags on and on, while Martin insists that the good part is "on the way". In South Park, Black Friday is about to dawn...until a last minute revelation that George R.R. Martin struck a new promotion deal with Sony and Microsoft, insiting that they say "screw it" and push back the date of Black Friday by a full week so everyone has more time to prepare, while increasing the promised discount to 96% off for the first one hundred people through the door. ''Game of Thrones'' references *Within the episode itself, everyone has watched Game of Thrones and use it as a guide for their actions. *Butters even visits George R.R. Martin at his home in Sante Fe to ask how the series will end, so he can tell what to do in the upcoming conflict. *Martin's appearance in the cartoon mocks how the release date for the books was stretched back by many years, while Martin insists that the best parts are "on their way". **Butters insists that the dragons haven't "shown up yet" even though he also says he watched to the end of Season 3. Actually, the dragons have shown up, but a complaint even among book fans is that they're still juveniles and don't do much yet (i.e. for all of book/Season 2 they're basically just the size of cats). Even as of the most current book, Daenerys's dragons are only just on the verge of being big enough to ride. Thus Butter's point generally stands: epic battles with people riding huge adult dragons into battle were promised, but the dragons take five books to grow to such a size. *Butters insists that he's annoyed how the TV series shows too many "wieners" and not enough dragons. Actually, a fan complaint is that the instances of male full frontal nudity have been extremely rare and drastically out of proportion compared to the massive number of female nude scenes. **Butters makes a point that HBO can't show an erect penis on TV, but this strains the credibility of scenes for him, i.e. that Theon Greyjoy's penis is flacid immediately after he finishes penetrating the prostitute Ros, when it logically shouldn't be. Meanwhile, Butters notes that they can show an erect penis for a gay man, because this must be less offensive or frightening - apparently the sex scene between Ser Loras Tyrell and Olyvar in Season 3's "Kissed by Fire". *When Martin answers the door, he initially assumes that Butters is another fan here to complain that he was traumatized by the Red Wedding. *Despite drastically exaggerating the number of penises involved, South Park's version of George R.R. Martin gives a fairly accurate (and spoiler filled) summation of the events of the Purple Wedding, which will only happen in the as yet unaired Season 4. *Kenny McCormick cosplays as Daenerys Targaryen. Actually, Kenny's costume was originally developed for the South Park video game The Stick of Truth, and is modeled on Princess Zelda - thus explaining why it has several Japanese anime tropes including a "magical girlfriend" heart-shaped emblem. It looks similar enough to Daenerys that Kenny simply re-used it for his Game of Thrones cosplay. *Tweek cosplays as Khal Drogo. *The TV anchors are a brother-sister team having an incestuous sexual relationship, like Cersei and Jaime Lannister. *The mobs of people swarming around the shopping mall before Black Friday are treated like the Wight-zombies, while the shopping mall security guards are an analogue of the Night's Watch. *The heraldry of several major Houses is accurately depicted in the background of several scenes, including the direwolf of House Stark and the stag of House Baratheon. The colors for the House Targaryen sigil are reversed: the Targaryen heraldry is a red dragon on a black background, but the episode depicts a black dragon on a red background. Then again, this is an accurate depiction of the heraldry of House Blackfyre, a cadet branch of House Targaryen which intentionally reversed the colors. See also * Black Friday (South Park) article on Wikipedia Category:Game of Thrones Category:Critical reception Category:Production